Adelaide and KI
I am now in Goolwa. At the mouth of the Murray river. One might say: "That's only 100km from Adelaide. What have you been doing with yourself Anthony?" Well thanks for asking...
After 3 days in Adelaide, I checked out of my hostel and began cycling down the river Torrens and then south along the beach. All was well and good until my pedals stopped turning. I hopped off and had a quick look. Yep, sure enough, my skewer was moving with the wheel which is not cool. Luckily I was only a 2km walk from a nearby suburban mall. I removed the skewer and haphazardly pushed the bike through the mall (getting a whole bunch of uneducated and disapproving looks). The guy at the bike shop took apart the hub and sure enough the axle had committed suicide and taken the internal hub mechanism with it. Stannish cycles don't do Shimano parts (WTF?) so he sent me a kilometre down the road to Bernie Jones cycles. They tried to find the specific parts needed, but no luck. So I caught a taxi back to Adelaide (yay) and checked into Bicycle Express. They attempted a fix, but failed when they realised I had 36 spoke wheels instead of 32. So I walked to JT cycles, bought a 36 hole Shimano Deore XL and brought it back to bicycles express. Four bicycle stores and half a day of transporting a broken bike around. At first I was pissed off. But then I realised I was very very lucky that my hub broke on the outskirts of Adelaide. It could have happened in William Creek. And I would've been f**ked (scuse the French, but it's true).
Anyway. Since I was back in Adelaide, I thought I'd go and explore the things I missed out on in my first three days:
- Starting a Die Hard movie marathon. Myself, a Brit and a Dutch guy watched all four Die Hards, Boondock Saints, Terminator 2 and Transormer 2 in one day. That's 16 hours of movie watching.
- Checked out the Royal Adelaide show. It was huge. And festivally. Much food was eaten.
- The obligatory night out in Heinley St.
- The obligatory hangover day.
Having caught up on the 2 months of social normality I'd missed out on, I once again set out on the road. This time, my rear wheel stuck together, and apart from my first puncture (from a piece of barbed wire), I made it safely to Normanville after 116 kms.
The next day I was at Cape Jervis by noon and my bike and myself were transported by Ferry across the backstairs passage to Penneshaw, Kangaroo Island ("KI" as the locals call it). For the next 8 days, I cycled around the Island. I saw heaps of wildlife. Echidnas, tiger snakes, goannas, wallabies, koalas, seals, wedge-tailed eagles. The seal colony at Admiral's arch was quite entertaining. The boardwalk allows you to get within metres of the seals and they just don't care that you're there. I met Liz and Scott, two ex-teachers who have toured through most parts of the world. They own a property on Pelican Lagoon, where I bunked down for 2 nights, in which time we traded stories and advice and I was able to revitalise. Thanks guys.
Two days ago, I finally made it onto the ferry and started heading in the general direction of the great ocean road. Next is the Coorong. It'll be nice to get into the sparse countryside again.
Hope everyone is well. The trip is goin swell. Bike touring is the greatest way to travel.
